How healthy is the Beyond Burger?
There’s a lot of reasons why you may choose to not to eat meat, and that’s completely perfect. There are healthy and unhealthy food choices, whether you’re consuming animal products or not. But I’d like to give you a little more information, and share some new studies, about a new trend for fake meat — products such as the “Beyond Meat Burger”, which are getting so popular these days.
If you are not familiar with this, then the Beyond Burger is a new plant-based burger that tastes like a real meat burger. It even bleeds like real meat! The company was founded in 2009 by Ethan Brown, and the burgers became available in 2013. The idea is that you get the same experience as if you’re eating meat, but you’re actually not eating any animal products.
Here’s an example of the ingredients and nutritional info from the Beyond Burger Frozen Patties that’s selling at Spud:
Ingredients: Water, Pea Protein Isolate, Expeller-Pressed Canola Oil, Refined Coconut Oil, Contains 2% or less of the following: Cellulose from Bamboo, Methylcellulose, Potato Starch, Natural Flavor, Maltodextrin, Yeast Extract, Salt, Sunflower Oil, Vegetable Glycerin, Dried Yeast, Gum Arabic, Citrus Extract (to protect quality), Ascorbic Acid (to maintain color), Beet Juice Extract (for color), Acetic Acid, Succinic Acid, Modified Food Starch, Annatto (for color).
Nutritional info: 22g fat (8g saturated, 0 g trans) (34%), 6g carbohydrates, 3g fibre (12%), 0g sugar (0%), 20g protein (32%), 0mg cholesterol, 460mg sodium (19%)
And here’s the A&W Beyond Meat Burger Patty:
Ingredients: Water, pea protein isolate, expeller-pressed canola oil, refined coconut oil, rice protein, mung bean protein, natural flavors, methylcellulose, potato starch, sunflower oil, salt, potassium chloride, apple extract, vinegar, lemon juice concentrate, color blend (vegetable glycerine, maltodextrin, ascorbic acid, beet juice extract), sunflower lecithin, pomegranate fruit powder, lycopene (for color), vitamins and minerals (dried yeast, niacin [vitamin b3], pyridoxine hydrochloride [vitamin b6], thiamin hydrochloride [vitamin b1], riboflavin [vitamin b2], folic acid [vitamin b9], cyanocobalamin [vitamin b12], d-calcium pantothenate, pyridoxine hydrochloride,biotin, zinc sulfate). May contain soy.
How much actual food do you see any food in these lists?
There are other brands of fake meat burgers available too, for example a recent study looked at the “Impossible Burger” and showed that it tested eleven times higher for the weed killer Glyphosate residue than the Beyond Meat burger.
In case you are not familiar with Glyphosate, it is an herbicide, actually the most widely used herbicide in the world. It is sprayed on plants and prevents susceptible plants from making proteins that are needed for growth. In 2015, the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) identified glyphosate as a probable human carcinogen. Just recently, Monsanto was ordered to pay $2 billion in damages after a jury found that its Round-up weed killer, that contains Glyphosate, causes cancer.
Glyphosate is so toxic that the farmers and workers in the fields use protective clothing and masks, or spray from planes, to avoid any type of exposure. Unfortunately glyphosate, the main ingredient in Round-up, is found today in almost all fruits and vegetables, especially non-organic ones. Even organically grown fruits and vegetables can have it too, because we have depleted the soil and herbicides can travel big distances with wind and rain.
These new burgers are being marketed as a solution for “healthy” eating, when in fact 11 ppb of glyphosate herbicide consumption can be highly dangerous. Only 0.1 ppb of glyphosate has been shown to destroy gut bacteria, which is where the stronghold of the immune system lies. It would seem that consumers are being misled to believe that these burgers are healthy.
Of course, you can choose to be vegan, vegetarian, carnivore, or whatever you want. My only suggestion would be that please, if you choose not to eat meat, then don’t eat fake meat. Always try as much as possible to choose natural foods with a single ingredient.
Resources:
http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/gmo-impossible-burger-positive-carcinogenic-glyphosate
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1542356519303611
https://www.bmj.com/content/365/bmj.l1613
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/13/business/monsanto-roundup-cancer-verdict.html
https://www.spud.ca/catalogue/ProductDetails.cfm?part=MP0477
